hardpointe

Hardpointe still alive

Hardpointe still alive

2 min read hardpointeroguelikedevroguelikesUncategorized

Despite my lack of posts and entire blog going offline for a bit, I continue to develop Hardpointe in my “free time”. Progress did stall for the last half of 2018, but seeing all of the posts around 7DRLs earlier in Feb really pushed me to get back into making progress.

A lot of work has been behind the scenes since the last version. I did a lot of work to add a ‘radial’ menu. In an effort to reduce on-screen distraction and the number of button presses, when there is an ambiguous action, the radial menu pops up, and the available options always show up in the same spot. (e.g. ‘Heave’ is always the up key) It makes for much smoother gameplay.

Enemy AI was also changed to make them less omniscient and more cautious about doors. There was an annoying habit for  enemies to “wait” behind doors and punch you right as you walked in. This wasn’t really by design. Now enemies take a turn to go from non-alert to alert statuses. So if you walk into a room and they DO happen to be behind the door, they will act surprised for a beat. That gives you an opportunity to attack, back away, or do something else.

I didn’t do any power switching in this video but that menu has been streamlined as well. You can now just hit space + <slot to replace> and not have to page through multiple screens or even read anything if you don’t need to.

Here’s me dying on the 1st level because I messed up a dash somewhere and got hit. In a 3-hp game you really need to pay attention to every single hit. Apparently I’m a bit rusty.

Hardpointe version 0.3 released

Hardpointe version 0.3 released

2 min read hardpointeroguelikedevUncategorized

Latest version is now playable in the same spot.

New for version 0.3:

  • start menu, including daily & weekly seed generation
  • revamped the death & victory menus
  • fixed a few menu bugs (especially on death & victory)
  • added occasional monster spawning 
  • added end-game monster setup for the fight back to the surface
  • changed SHIELD power to also have a timed component
  • improved PHASEWALK power so that enemy attacks now go ‘through’ you – and hit other enemies
  • improved CLOAK power to trigger ‘surprise’ attacks (+1 damage) 
  • better handling of ending timed powers (shields, cloak, phasewalk), along with visual animation when they end
  • added a dedicated key (e) for wait only (useful in a few situations when using Space/Action can trigger the ambiguous input menu when you don’t want it to)
  • Shielded enemies now more intelligently turn on their shields
  • fleeing enemies will not run away forever – eventually they will recover and resume hunting
  • better names and descriptions for blasters
  • Added a new kinetic blaster (knockback effect)
  • Made the Archon a bit tougher (can no longer be stunned or hacked)
  • enemies knocked back into walls are briefly stunned (so you can set up wall attacks)
  • added a score stat, although it doesn’t track anything yet
  • fixed targeting bug that made it too easy to throw grenades and wreckage onto yourself

Next version progress & Phasewalk

Next version progress & Phasewalk

1 min read hardpointeroguelikedevUncategorized

Spent some development time beefing up the Cloak and Phasewalk powers. Cloak is fairly straightforward, but I wanted the enemies to react a little better. Instead of immediately giving up, they will move towards your last location. This means you can easily predict their movements and set up traps for them.

Attacking will remove your cloak, but also add +1 damage, which enables you to take out the tougher 2hp enemies relatively quickly — assuming you have a Cloak charge to spare.

Phasewalk has been in since day 1 – I initially added it as a debugging feature so I could walk through walls, and thought it was a pretty fun mechanic. Now it gets a bit more useful. When phased, your attacks won’t do any damage, but enemies can still attack you. Their attacks will pass ‘through’ you and hit anyone behind you.

This works for ranged attacks:

And melee:

I’ll roll out this version pretty soon. Meanwhile the game is still playable here.

Hardpointe v0.2 Long Play

1 min read hardpointeroguelikedevUncategorized

I did a full play-through of the game so far. Took me a lot longer than expected! I guess that’s a good sign. I also managed to not die. Definitely on the easier side at the moment – there are grenades and powers a-plenty. Here it is on youtube. I’ll try to add commentary next time.

Later versions will get a lot more brutal. More terrain, more enemies, fewer power-ups, and at least two more enemy types. I want to have some support-style enemies, with two in the works: one will keep it’s distance and put shields on near-by enemies, the second will be super-fast with no attacks, but be able to alert other enemies to your location.

I am also toying with some kind of factory-type system or enemy that will spew out countless 1-hp/1-damage enemies. Simple to handle in the right scenarios, but if left unaccounted for, it could make things very difficult.

Hardpointe ver0.2 is playable

Hardpointe ver0.2 is playable

1 min read hardpointeroguelikedevUncategorized

The latest version of hardpointe (I’m called it v0.2) is available to play here.

It’s a bit more polished than the first version, with a number of ease-of-play fixes and more varied enemies.

Change log:

  • Screen/font can now be enlarged/shrunk
  • Auto-pickup of items
  • ‘Brogue-style’ exits that you just walk into (this item and last item are meant to reduce over-reliance on the action key)
  • Removed redundant power install menu
  • No monsters in the starting room (whew)
  • Added fleeing enemies (Skirmisher)
  • Added shielded enemies (they will recharge if they escape): Skirmisher, Centurion
  • Added an EMP grenade that conveniently takes out shields
  • Fixed a bug with level changes caused by dropping through chasms (sometimes)
  • Added a final boss (sort of): The Archon. The only enemy in the game with more than 3 ‘health’ (shields + hit points)
  • Made the asteroid 6 levels
  • Monster count & difficulty level scale better with increasing levels
  • Player starts with the Hack power (fairly OP but I have not done much balancing)
Shielded enemies and the EMP Grenande in action

If you’ve played it, leave me a comment here, or on /r/roguelikedev. Enjoy.